Just like Mars? NASA team to spend 8 months on top of Hawaii volcano

Six NASA ‘astronauts’ have begun an eight-month simulated mission to replicate conditions on Mars, to test the social and psychological effects a real manned mission to the red planet would pose to humans.

Throughout the replica mission, the crew will have to follow protocols simulating their life on Earth’s closest planetary neighbor, like eating “shelf-stable” food fit for space travel and donning astronaut suits when they want to leave their living quarters and explore the ‘planet's surface.’